Glass Jars

Today started like any other day at work.  I came in at 7am to the Medical/Surgical ICU ready to jump into my RN duties for the next 12+ hours.  When I got there, I found out that a patient had a cardiac arrest and unfortunately did not make it.  Because I was only assigned one patient that morning (when we usually have 2), I offered to take our deceased patient down to the morgue.

As I entered the cold room that temporarily houses the "expired" men and women of our hospital, I looked around and saw them - three large glass jars, each with a fetus floating in what appeared to be formaldehyde.  On the outside of each jar was a sticker: 16 weeks, 18 weeks, 20 weeks, they read.

A number of thoughts and feelings rushed through my body at that moment, the most pronounced of which was surprise.  I couldn't believe how large and developed these babies were, even the 16 week old.  Little fingers and toes. Heads with well defined eye sockets, noses and mouths.  Visible blood vessels.  These were not subhuman beings.  Albeit small, they were people.  And even though they were dead, I could sense a life force all their own.

Now I'm not sure these babies were aborted, but I would bet that, for most people, a sight like this would bring to the surface personal beliefs about abortion.  And so was the case with me.

And my heart broke.  My heart broke because I couldn't believe that the gestational limit for legalized abortion is 24 weeks in most cases - when babies are far more developed than the ones I saw today. My heart broke when I thought about how many people believe that legalizing abortion protects a woman's right to choose. Because the reality is that a woman always has a right to choose.  Just like someone can choose whether they will take a hit of a crack pipe, or run a red light or steal a candy bar. The question is if there should be consequences to those choices.

I thought about situations when mother's decide they will abort because they feel like they can't take care of the baby.  And my heart goes out to them because I am sure that finding out you are pregnant when you don't have the means to take care of another person is agonizing.  I myself thought I was pregnant when I was 19 and in college.  The emotional roller coaster was something I don't wish on anyone.  But then I thought about a few close friends that have adopted babies and have been so blessed by the courage of their children's birth mothers who, instead of aborting, chose to  give their child an opportunity for a better life.  And, if I'm honest, I wish every person who finds themselves in an unwanted pregnancy would do that same thing.

This issue is certainly emotionally complex. But the truth is that what is emotionally complex is not always Biblically complex.  Sometimes, it's actually quite simple.  And as I stared at those glass jars, this scripture was brought to my remembrance:

"Oh yes, You shaped me first inside, then out;

You formed me in my mother's womb.

I thank you, High God - You're breathtaking!

Body and soul, I am marvelously made!

I worship in adoration - what a creation!

You know me inside and out, 

You know every bone in my body;

You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,

Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;

All the stages of my life were spread out before You, 

The days of my life all prepared

Before I'd even lived one day."

Psalms 139: 13-16 (The Message Bible)

My prayer is that we all would recognize the value of each individual life, both born and unborn. That we would be people willing to sacrifice our own comfort for the sake of another.  And that we would turn to God and trust that when we do things His way, even though it may require much more than we think we can handle, He will work out all things for our good.